Using the Available Spiritual Resources

The deceased was a forty-eight-year-old married man with five children in their late teens and early twenties. He was a recovering alcoholic with a twelve-year chip.

He had been sick for two days with influenza, and, while having had some high blood pressure problems some years earlier, showed no signs for alarm. He simply failed to wake up one morning.

The family was unchurched and seemingly bereft of spiritual resources until it became evident that most of them were participating in twelve-step recovery programs. It was then evident that the most useful resource to assist them in their extreme grief was to put them back in touch with their Alcoholics Anonymous programs which had already helped them deal with other crises.

We are here for three reasons:…